We give lip service to the belief that “life is sacred” or that “each life is unique”, but a society’s actions rarely support the sincerity of such a belief. Sincerity of words cannot be affirmed by more words piled on top of words previously spoken; rather, it can only be validated through actions affirming such words, lest emptiness of belief be revealed through the inaction evidencing hypocrisy. How we treat one another; what we are willing to do for our fellow man; how we treat both strangers and friends alike; these actions, in contrast to the words we use, show and reveal the cheapness of life.

There is the “outside” perspective as opposed to the “inside view”, and that is the mistake people make in various sectors of life: The “outsider” believes that, from a position and perspective of detachment and therefore objectivity, he or she is able to better assess, evaluate and analyze the event, situation or conditions experienced than by those on the “inside”.

By contrast, the “insider” views the outsider with suspicion, contending that he or she has no idea about the experiences and existential difficulties faced by the insider, and that a detached, objective viewpoint which fails to take into consideration the subjective, “personal” side of things misses the essential point of the issue.

It is the tension which exists between the townspeople and the “out-of-towner”; the one who lives in a community as opposed to the renter or investor; or of the person who drives around the neighborhood admiring the green lawns, the peaceful nature and the tranquility of a community, hoping to one day purchase a home there without knowing the problems inherent — say, that the water is contaminated or that there has been a rash of burglaries on the rise in recent years.

How does one break the invisible wall between the inside view and the outside perspective? When does the demarcation between the two disappear? Do numbers of years living within a community determine whether an outsider becomes an insider?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application because of a medical condition which has come to a critical point where the Federal or Postal worker can no longer perform one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, it often “feels” like one has all of a sudden become an “outsider” again — not only from one’s own agency or the Postal Service, but moreover, because of the complexity of the administrative procedures and bureaucratic morass of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management — of the sense that the whole process is strange and detached.

Posted on September 12, 2018 by Federal Disability Retirement Attorney

It is when the hushed voices pause as you pass by the proverbial water cooler where gossip is abandoned and conversations suddenly and abruptly cease; then, when distance is the safety net like the arc of flight envisioned by species in the wild, those coworkers nod, shake their heads and disperse like so many rats around a decaying carcass on the roadside until the oncoming truck rumbles close enough to sound an alarm.

There are whispers that echo and reverberate, and it is only when the sounds bounce back from the caves of despair does it finally dawn upon the soul it effects: Those whispers are of a former self who, as a Federal or Postal employee, blazed new trails, always came early and left late, and never shirked responsibility in promoting the efficiency of the Federal Service.

The skeleton of that former self remains; and now, but for the whispers that howl like the winter winds across plains of abandoned and forsaken times, those voices begin to sound like the din of unlikely foes. What ever happened to that person who once lead the charge of the cavalry forward in each and every fight?

Health deteriorates, and over time, age and health become the combined enemy of youthful vigor that sprouted in innocence of antiquity in former times now gone.

When those whispers of a former self begin to speak, it may be time to begin to prepare, formulate and file a Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS offset, with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, lest the whispers of a former self remain to be subjected to further humiliation, like an unceremonious termination without applause or fanfare.

What is it about the ascription of such a word, that there can be a direct correlation or, if taken in a different context, some mere connection but no causality? We can say of a person, “He is responsible for X”, and yet never have directly encountered X or (if a person) never even have met X.

Thus of monsters and thugs throughout history, for instance, we might say that “Stalin was responsible for 20 million deaths, at least,” or that Mao was “responsible” for a 100 million peasants dying during the late 50s; or, of course, of ascribing to Hitler the countless millions; and, so that we don’t leave out other “responsible” monsters of history, of Pol Pot, Idi Amin and many others besides, though we cannot link a causality that would pass Hume’s skeptical test of anything more than events following one upon another, we nevertheless accept that all such political figures were “responsible” for the deaths of millions.

What is the criteria in coming to such a conclusion? Is it a negative proposition — that if X had the power or position to prevent such events from occurring, then Responsibility-Y can be ascribed? Or must it be a positive declaration: If X engaged in Acts A, B and C, then Responsibility-Y can be attributable to Individual-W; and further, if only Acts A & B, but not C, then less so; and if only Act A, but not B & C, even less so?

“Responsibility”, of course, is a malleable and transitive concept; it can change with the contextual winds of opinion, historical perspective and a cultural shift of viewpoints. Look at how we approach our Founding Fathers — of responsibility for the slave issue in the United States, but somehow excusing each if (A) any one of them willed that they would be freed upon their deaths, (B) that one was “personally” against the issue but for economic, practical reasons were “forced” to go along or (C) they treated them “kindly” and “responsibly” (here, we have a double-meaning of the term, for such an individual was both “responsible” as well as being ascribed the “responsibility” of being a slave owner).

Or, look at the manner in which America treated Native Americans — of a genocidal history no less cruel than Mao’s starvation of the peasantry; and yet, because of such grand concepts as “manifest destiny” and the depiction of an entire populace as “uncivilized”, we can avert “responsibility” by distancing the causal agents; and the greater distance between the agents, the less we ascribe responsibility.

On a lesser scale, what about work? If work suffers and there is no reason for it but laziness and lack of attention, we ascribe “responsibility”. But what if a medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties — is that Federal or Postal employee “responsible”?

The short answer is a “no” — and that is recognized by “the Law”, in statutes, regulations and case-laws cumulatively aggregated under the conceptual aegis of “Federal Disability Retirement Law”. It is precisely because society recognizes that a medical condition itself — and not the individual — is directly responsible for one’s inability to perform one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties, that Federal disability retirement exists as a benefit to pursue.

But it cannot be accessed until and unless there is an affirmative step taken by the Federal or Postal employee, by preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset. That is where “responsibility” comes into play as a direct causal link — of initiating the steps and actually filing.

Most of us live linear lives. It is a characteristic of Western Civilization that the thought-processes involve a sequential, step-by-step, logical extension and advancement.

Much has been said about this approach, in contrast to an “Eastern” philosophical methodology, where there is a “circular” mind-set that often involves the complexities of reincarnation, capacity to assimilate inconsistent, incommensurate and seemingly incompatible belief-systems – and, indeed, to even describe the “other” as a “methodology” is an oxymoron of unfair proportions, for it is more of an amalgamation of acceptance without hesitation – like the symbiosis of Shinto and Zen Buddhism in Japanese culture.

Such an approach – of a straight line from Point A to Destination X – that reflects the essence of the Western culture, including Continental Europe, the British linguistic solutions and the U.S. pragmatism that dominates, leaves us with an emptiness when we encounter and engage the unsolvable dilemma. Perhaps that is the primary deficit in “our” approach, as opposed to the “other” one. For, in attempting to think always in a linear fashion, we become frustrated when the solution cannot be figured out or otherwise consummated.

A problem left unsolved is one that we consider to be a failure of sorts, because the pragmatism of Western thought requires that all problems have solutions; it is a paradigm that has been ingrained in the DNA of our very being and essence. But life doesn’t quite work in that way, does it? There are unsolvable problems – where we just have to accept what “is” and move on with the deficit of a solution.

Medical conditions comprise one such class of such unsolvable issues. We like to think that the “science” of medicine provides for a cure through complex and technologically modern treatment modalities for every identification of diagnosed maladies; but it quickly becomes obvious that many medical conditions simply do not have a linear resolution.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker from performing all of the essential elements of the Federal or Postal job, the linear approach of Western Civilization often will not work. There is an incompatible friction that quickly arises between the Federal agency and the Postal facility, and the Federal employee and Postal worker.

Often, the only “solution” is an exit via filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, submitted for consideration ultimately to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Does it “solve” the problem? Not really. For the Federal or Postal employee, the medical condition continues with him or her after separation from the Federal workforce; and for the agency or the Postal facility, the loss of a formerly valuable and productive employee invested in for those many years, cannot easily be replaced.

But getting a Federal Disability Retirement annuity is a compromise of sorts; it allows for the Federal or Postal employee to seek other opportunities in the private sector, and to attend to the medical conditions with greater focus; and for the Federal agency and Postal facility, it allows for employment of another, more healthier worker who can fulfill all of the essential elements of the job. Nevertheless, it remains an “unsolvable dilemma”, to be relegated to the “Eastern” approach, and leaving a void to the “Western” perspective.

We tend to delay that which we know is best for us, and embrace the moment for which we pay a dear price. Man was created to engage projects; a purpose for life, a value for living, a reason to live. Why it is important to initiate, continue, accomplish and involve, are considerable in quantity: to make a living; to be compensated for work employed; to create and construct for the betterment of community and the greater world; and not merely because Heidegger posits that it is to avoid our mortality and the inevitability of our fate.

It is a worthwhile endeavor, and not something to be ashamed of. It is, however, when the focus upon tomorrow’s project becomes all-consuming such that it takes priority over health, family and self-preservation that something becomes dangerously and irrationally askew, then such prioritizing of life’s opportunities is undermined by an obsessive culture of a singular focus towards self-destruction.

Tomorrow’s project may need to be delay, or abandoned altogether. Whether we make decisions in life by prioritizing through some category of rationality, or life forces such rearrangements by the compelling introduction of sickness, deterioration of health, or a traumatic turn of events, issues delayed or otherwise avoided tend to come back to remind, irritate or others demand.

There is never an end to human projects; if fear of exhausting the human capacity to devise is ever questioned, such a query is akin to puzzlement of philosophical questions consistent throughout Western history – each generation revives the conundrums of the past precisely because that is what it means to be human.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers, there is no difference in kind or type; like all other workers and bee-like busy-ness in this universe of activity, the list of “tomorrow’s” projects is long and often left to a haphazard delineation not intended to be categorized in any rational priority of accomplishments.

Events, however, tend to force things upon us otherwise left unattended, and preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is often one of those “tomorrow” projects cast aside to be delayed – until that life event compels action. Perhaps the delay is rationally-based; perhaps it is a procrastination of necessity; or, more likely, a necessity that is avoided like the plague of yesterday until the symptoms of decay and destruction compel the magnification to the forefront of our lives.

Admitting and submitting to an inevitable concern previously left for tomorrow is never a pleasant concession, but at some point, tomorrow’s project delayed – especially the necessity to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management – may become today’s necessary action required immediately; and, in that event, it may be wise to seek the counsel of a lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement law.

Where are they? Beyond Platonic Forms and heavenly orbs where the golden dust sparingly sprinkled from the wings of angels in flight, do perfect lives exist and, if so, where? We can suspend disbelief and fantasize of celebrities and the lives of Wall Street wolves with their mansions, beautiful bodies and facial grimaces so tightened by plastic surgery as to make smiling an exertion of monumental phenomena; but, in the end, we all realize that the pinnacle of human achievement is but another endeavor of human fallacy, and never approaching the omniscience of an Aristotelian Unmoved Mover.

If we posit that perfect lives do not exist, then does that vanquish the argument for perfection even of relevance in conceptual or hypothetical argumentation? If that, then why strive for betterment at all, if there is no standard to which one should attempt to reach? If everything is merely relative, how can we compare a relativity devoid of standards upon a non-existent spectrum between good, better and best?

Perfection, of course, for the obsessed, can be paralyzing, precisely because a further amendment, another change, an additional revision, can always arguably make it “more perfect” than not, and therefore one can be left swimming amidst the toxicity of a never-ending eternity of perfecting the imperfections that can never achieve perfection.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are preparing an imperfect Federal OPM Disability Retirement application, to be submitted first through one’s agency and the Human Resource Office (if still with the agency or, even if separated, not for more than 31 days), then on to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, be wary of becoming immobilized because you are unable to reach a standard of perfection that will “guarantee” a First Stage Success.

Life never allows for guarantees, leaving aside perfection in an imperfect world. Administrative and bureaucratic procedures mirror life itself: OPM’s imperfect methodology of human engagement in determining the validity of a Federal Disability Retirement application is simply another component within life’s vast array of imperfection.

The key in preparing a Federal Disability Retirement application is not whether the Federal Disability Retirement packet is “perfectly” compiled, but the more relevant question: Is it an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, with the components included of a persuasive narrative, a strong legal argument, and a methodology which includes a roadmap for the U.S. Office of Personnel Management to approve the Federal Disability Retirement application?

Seven False Myths about OPM Disability Retirement

1) I have to be totally disabled to get Postal or Federal disability retirement.
False: You are eligible for disability retirement so long as you are unable to perform one or more of the essential elements of your job. Thus, it is a much lower standard of disability.

2) My injury or illness has to be job-related.
False: You can get disability even if your condition is not work related. If your medical condition impacts your ability to perform any of the core elements of your job, you are eligible, regardless of how or where your condition occurred.

3) I have to quit my federal job first to get disability.
False: In most cases, you can apply while continuing to work at your present job, to the extent you are able.

4) I can't get disability if I suffer from a mental or nervous condition.
False: If your condition affects your job performance, you can still qualify. Psychiatric conditions are treated no differently from physical conditions.

5) Disability retirement is approved by DOL Workers Comp.
False: It's the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) the federal agency that administers and approves disability for employees at the US Postal Service or other federal agencies.

6) I can wait for OPM disability retirement for many years after separation.
False: You only have one year from the date of separation from service - otherwise, you lose your right forever.

7) If I get disability retirement, I won't be able to apply for Scheduled Award (SA).
False: You can get a Scheduled Award under the rules of OWCP even after you get approved for OPM disability retirement.